1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is concerned with a process for producing maltopentaose from amylose, and in particular, to a process involving the reaction of amylose with the enzyme amylase.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
It has recently been discovered that maltopentaose is one of a limited number of polysaccharides which can be used as a substrate in a preferred diagnostic procedure to measure serum amylase. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,879,263 which issued to Thomas Adams on Apr. 22, 1975.
Although maltopentaose is one of the hydrolysis products of starch reacted with various amylases, the other products of this reaction (i.e., glucose and the other polysaccharides formed by the linked glucose molecules) predominate. Since only a very small percentage of the reaction product is maltopentaose, the hydrolysis of starch by amylase does not lend itself well to a commercial process for producing maltopentaose.
It is known that amylase obtained from a particular source, Bacillus licheniformis, when reacted with amylose or amylopectin produces a higher percentage of maltopentaose than produced when other sources of amylase are used. See the article by Saito in the Archives of Biochemistry and Biophysics, 155, 290 (1973). However, the yield of maltopentaose from such reactions is still small because of the limited solubility of amylose in the aqueous medium required for the biological hydrolysis.